Van der Lubbe, who co-founded the event, remembers its much more humble beginnings when she was "happy with 5,000" visitors.

Strijp-S during Dutch Design Week in Eindhoven

She reveals the first Dutch Design Week was borne out of a frustration among local designers over the lack of a proper platform to present their work.

"Why do we always have to go to Milan to show our work, as if you are only something in design if you are there?" she asks. "In Holland there was nothing, so let's see if we can actually pull something off here."

Area 51 skatepark in a former industrial building in Strijp, Eindhoven

Van der Lubbe believes that the pro-active spirit of Eindhoven-based designers helped Dutch Design Week quickly get off the ground and grow into the event that it is today.

"There were all kinds of initiatives going on," she says. "There's a good urban culture here; people are actually doing stuff instead of talking, which is a big difference, and it grew up to be this huge event."

"But when the [economic] crisis came in, that all changed. I think it is now the obligation of companies to create opportunities for creative people to grow. I think that is also the role of Dutch Design Week, to be between culture and the money."

Wire frame of a chair by Nacho Carbonell

Next, van der Lubbe takes us to Sectie C, a new design district where young designers including Nacho Carbonell open their studios up to the public. We then head to Eat Drink Design at Kazerne, a gallery and restaurant housed in a former army barracks.

Sectie C during Dutch Design Week

"[Dutch Design Week] is really different from all the design weeks in the world because it comes out of the designers themselves," says van der Lubbe. "They open up their doors, you're welcome in their studios or in their workspaces. You actually can feel the vibe of innovation and of new developments."

Eat Drink Design at Kazerne, Eindhoven

"Martijn Paulen, the new director of Dutch Design Week, said: 'what is visible in Milan in two years, you can see that here now.'"

Related movie:

In our first video report from Eindhoven, van der Lubbe explains how the small industrial town has become one of the leading centres for design and technology in the world.
Watch a larger version of this movie »

Posted on Friday, November 8th, 2013 at 5:00 pm by Ben Hobson.
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ilo sunchez

And they are all in Ventura Lambrate! Cool sense of humour!

Lorenzo Corti

All this hate for Milan Salone? I wander why every single year it mark records of visitors? In my opinion Milan is where the industrial design sits. Art and crafts is just another story.

Steve

I completely agree. There should be a clearer point of view from Dezeen. Milan is all about the industry, and clients and making money at the end of the day. What is going on in Holland could be almost compared with the Biennale in Venice. I am sorry to say but it’s basically art and not design.

I find the statements by Miriam van der Lubbe to be very arrogant. She needs to understand that the reason the Milan fair works is because of the actual fair in Rho.

ilo sunchez

Dutch works are shown by Dutch organisations in Milan so I can’t understand two things: first are they insulting their selves ? Second, if they think they are so forward looking even in design art, why they are all presenting the Dutch projects in Milan?

Milan is still where all creativity is, we just need some more communication power and more Italians who supports their locals!

Guest

London and Eindhoven are fighting to gain more visibility. I personally believe that Dezeen’s journalists are supporting the idea that Milan is losing.

For example, in Patrizia Moroso’s interview ‘Milan sitting in the past’ the interview’s extract was only reporting about the negative aspects Moroso said about Milan, while in the full interview she said that production in Milan is the top: ‘Milan has a lot of important human knowledge about making things, and I think we in Italy are fantastic at doing what we are able to do,’ adding ‘in furniture it’s one of the best places in the world and one of the few places in Europe because we maintain these capabilities. In England, for some reason you lost these capabilities. You also were making, now I don’t know. You are great at thinking; that is something important.’ Then she shifts the discourse to culture and to a socio/political critique to Italy.

Thus van der Lubbe’s argument about ‘people are actually doing stuff instead of talking’ referring to Milan is totally foolish. Because Milan, and Italy in general, is undoubtedly a place of making. Made in Italy or Made in NL?! Which one does exist?

Nevertheless, I wish a lot of success to both, Van der Lubbe and Dezeen editors, in their joint fight against Milan.

Industry is in Milan since half of the XIX century.
If what designers do there is talking, it has been pretty effective for the last 170 years.

What most of the designers do in the Italian industrial districts is industrial design, a manifestation of thinking and culture finalised for industrial production, a process that from the 50s gave 60min of Italians their bikes, car, houses, furniture and clothing and now is exporting excellence throughout the globe.

A had a lot of talks with Dutch designers in Milan when they come to get some exposure.
I find Dutch design is a very interesting current but I too consider it more as design-art or art and crafts… to me it’s more interesting at a conceptual level and for its research on the process.

It’s very inspiring, it’s “design for designers”, so to say.

That said, my belief is that the only design that impacts the world, that matters on global scale, that improves and facilitates life, that empowers people to realise their potential and that bring our societies forward in the evolution is industrial process based, it’s industrial design.